Winter's End is Close
by Haely Potter
Summary: Bran sits on Drogon's back as they fly together towards the Wall, Summer dangling in Drogon's claws. Fifth in the Queen Arya 'verse.


Bran sat on Drogon's back as they fly together towards the Wall, Summer dangling in Drogon's claws. He wiggles his toes in excitement. The Old Gods had some powerful magic, able to heal his legs. They would need a lot of work before he'd be able to walk steadily, run and climb again, but he had his legs back.

Drogon had been flying somewhere above the Land-Beyond-the-Wall when Bran had felt it, a second part of his soul, like Summer. By then he'd been practiced in warging and had easily slipped into Drogon's skin. The mind there had been confused. It's mother had died, it's siblings had accepted a new mother but Drogon wouldn't bow to someone not worthy. And it had felt the call in its blood to fly over the big water and to the cold place where it was now. And now there was a part of it in his mind it had never felt before, but it felt right. It had found the new one it would bow to, itself. In joy it released a huge burst of fire toward the wrong smelling little things walking down below and roared when they fell down, burning. Then it flew where itself wanted.

At first Bran could barely believe his third natural skin (his own, Summer and now Drogon) was a dragon, straight from Old Nan's tales but the more he got to know Drogon, he understood that the dragon was the part of himself that wanted to kill Theon Greyjoy, flay the Boltons and boil the Freys. Drogon was the uncontrollable part of his instincts while Summer was the controlled part.

His sons are bound to his back, like he had been bound to Hodor's once upon a time, all bundled up in furs the Children of the Forest had gifted him. Little Jojen and Robb Stark had their mother's green eyes, Bran's dark red hair and Eddard Stark's face.

The brief memory of Meera brings back her last moments. It had been a few weeks after she had birthed little Jojen and Robb and she had been feverish and she had clutched Bran's hand as tightly as she could and pleaded him to keep Jojen safe. Bran wasn't sure if she was talking of her dead brother or their son but promised her anyway. That was her last, semi-lucid moment and she died two hours later, her hold slackening on her Prince's hand.

Hodor had died too, when Meera had been a month away from giving birth. He had wandered out of the cave and no one had been vigilant enough to call him back before the Others got to him. They had burned the body that Summer had dragged in, preventing him from rising and joining the horde of the walking dead.  
Jojen, Meera's greenseer brother, had died a month after they got to the cave. He had given his life to strengthen the wards on the cave, saying it was all he was good for anymore. Meera had been furious with him, shouted at him, cried at him, slapped him, held him, tried to convince him of something but Jojen had shaken his head and taken the knife Leaf had brought him before cutting his wrist and letting his blood willingly flow into the wards. With his last strength Jojen had smiled at Meera and just as life fled his eyes, a tear leaked from his right eye.

All three had joined the weirwood trees and Bran could talk to them whenever he liked but it would never be the same. Father and Robb had joined the weirwood trees too, before Bran even knew that was possible. When Osha, the wildling he'd charged with Rickon's safety, joined them, he'd gone to his baby brother's dreams for the first time, to make sure he would be alright. He told him where he was, what he was doing, how Rickon could never tell anyone he was alive, about the souls in the weirwood trees.

After that night he'd tried to visit his other siblings' dreams and found his way barred. Arya was on the other side of the narrow sea and nowhere near a live weirwood tree. Sansa was in the Vale where weirwood trees hadn't grown even during Age of the First Men. The reason he even knew where his sisters were, was because even dead weirwood channels some of the Old Gods' power, therefore channeling Bran, and Bran found his sisters through the weirwood throne of the Eyre and a pair of weirwood doors in Braavos. Jon, on the other hand, was a completely different matter. Jon had become a subject of R'hllor when the red priestess Melisandre revived him after his betrayal and the Old Gods had no say in other Gods' property, even if they used to keep the Old Gods and still prayed to them after. This saddened Bran because now Jon would never join Robb and father and Jon's own mother in the weirwood trees.

Bran shakes his head to clear his thoughts. He could ponder on the contradiction of Gods having rules later. He could already hear the fighting on the Wall and feel the magic holding the Wall together breaking.

He smiles and urges Drogon to fly faster, drawing the ancient Dragon glass sword. He has some Others to kill.


End file.
